The year after I graduated from college, I volunteered fulltime through the AmeriCorps program at a Food Bank in North Carolina. In addition to working in the warehouse and monitoring agencies, my fellow volunteers and I also had monthly classes on a variety of topics. My favorite was a budgeting class. Though most of us were scraping by our living stipend, we still had income and expenses like everyone else. Our homework was to track our expenses and income for a month and then come back to class to talk about what we noticed. After that month, I realized that I had picked up a terrible habit. I had worked very hard to save money during that year. As a reward for saving money, every week I would treat myself to something small. But when I did the math, I realized the amount I had saved was much less than the amount with which I was treating myself. The realization was shocking and wildly disappointing.

On Sunday, we are submitting our pledge commitments for the coming year at Hickory Neck. Part of our Living Generously campaign has been talking about the powerful ministries at Hickory Neck that mean so much to us. We have read parishioner reflections, biblical reflections from national church leaders, and a great narrative budget that helps us see how our finances function. My husband and I are inspired and expectant about the future of Hickory Neck, and we are overjoyed to join the pledging effort to support our ministry.

Inspiration has not been a problem. In fact, my husband and I talked about how we want to increase our pledge this year. But as we looked at the numbers, we realized in order to align our budget with our passion, we were going to have to adjust some things. For us, that means at least a few less meals out each month. It also may mean being a bit more discerning about wants versus needs. It will certainly mean keeping an eye on making sure that we are able to keep our pledge next year by saving the amount needed for our increase and not “treating” ourselves disproportionally to our increased pledge.

As the Vestry talked about Stewardship, the Vestry all realized our church giving was motivated by different things. For some of us, understanding the mission of the church and how our pledge would be used was critical. For others of us, we needed our giving to be rooted in a theological or spiritual understanding of resources and our stewardship of those resources. While for others of us, our giving was more motivated by looking around us, taking stock of all the things we like about church, and calculating how much those things cost. My hope is that our campaign has addressed all of those approaches and that our journey through stewardship season has inspired and rooted you. I look forward to hearing your story of our journey together and kicking off another great year!

Today we honor St. Francis of Assisi, one of the most beloved saints of the church. Most of us think of Francis as the patron saint of animals and creation. When we think of him we may think of a St. Francis statue in a garden. We may think of various images of him preaching to birds. Some of us may even recall that tale where Francis negotiated peace between a village and a wolf that had been terrorizing the town. That is why when we celebrate St. Francis’ feast, we also bless animals – the creatures that were so dear to him. That is also why we often worship outside – honoring God’s creation, which Francis loved so profoundly.

The challenge with honoring Francis in this way is that we forget the other parts of Francis’ life – quite frankly, the much more difficult parts of St. Francis’ life. You see, Francis’ love of creation comes from a deeper place. Francis first started his journey to God out of a new relationship with wealth. Francis was the son of a wealthy businessman in the 1100s. He had everything at his disposal, and his father wanted him to enjoy that privilege and pass that privilege to Francis’ own children. But in his early twenties, Francis had an encounter with a beggar that changed everything. Suddenly the trappings of wealth no longer felt like a safety net or source of comfort – they feel like a burden – a barrier to the life Christ calls us to lead.

And so, Francis renounced the wealth in his life, reportedly even stripping off the clothes his father had given him to show how fully committed he was to this new way of life. He married “Lady Poverty,” and invited others to join him. The lifestyle is so austere that many joke that that Francis is one of the most revered, and yet, least followed saints of our faith.

I remember in college having long conversations about living in solidarity with the poor. We were presented the idea over and over again, but we could not get our heads around what living in solidarity with the poor meant. Several graduates tried – volunteering for at least a year after college. Some joined intentional Christian communities, in the hopes that living simple lives in community might help them get closer to that solidarity. Some traveled to impoverished countries to serve among the poorest, while others worked in the nonprofit sector in the States. But we always came back to one crucial question: can we live in solidarity with the poor? Most of us have a safety net, whether our safety net is family, wealth, education, or citizenship. Can we even help the poor if we renounce everything like Francis?

I must confess, I do not think there is a good answer to the question about living in solidarity with the poor. And I am not convinced that most of us can live like Francis, begging and living in tattered clothes. But what Francis is trying to do is help us see how money gets in the way of our relationship with everything else. That is why Jesus talked about money so much. Jesus even led a life much more similar to Francis’ than ours – wandering through life, depending on the hospitality of strangers, and telling his disciples to give up staffs and bags when they go out to meet the people. Both Jesus and Francis began to learn that living without the comfort of wealth meant entering oneself into a state of vulnerability – a state where true, holy, meaningful relationships begin; a state where everything’s value changes – down to the birds that sing, the creation that breathes beauty, and even the pets that show us unconditional love.

Of course, each of us has to discern what taking up Jesus’ or Francis’ way means for us, knowing that many of us have family obligations and debts that must be managed. But what Jesus and Francis do today is invite us to not allow those burdens to become an excuse for not making ourselves vulnerable. Jesus says today, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” For those of you who have worked with farm animals, you know that yokes are meant to fit smoothly on to animals, distributing the weight and burden in a manageable way.[i] That is what taking on the yoke of Christ, and walking the way of Francis is like – a life, that if taken on, is manageable. We may be scared to put on our shoulders the burden of vulnerability. But Jesus promises the burden is light, the yoke is easy. And Francis shows us the world of beauty that opens when we simply let go. Amen.

This week, Hickory Neck is hosting its 16thAnnual Fall Festival. Not having seen a Fall Festival at Hickory Neck myself, I cannot give you an endorsement from experience. But here’s what I can tell you. The Fall Festival highlights all that is good about Hickory Neck. Parishioners old and young, newcomers and old-timers, those working and those retired have all chipped in to prepare for the event together. People volunteered readily, volunteers charged forward with their assigned tasks, leaders recruited with ease, and parishioners have been baking and purging their “attic treasures.” Church members and friends have been sharing the word with their neighbors, and the grounds are slowly transforming as we prepare for the big event.

Even more impressive to me is that all the proceeds of the Festival are earmarked for Mission and Outreach. All the hard work going into this event is all for the benefit of our neighbors in need. The passion poured into this event is as strong as the passion for the ministries we serve. Just last week, I visited one of our beneficiaries, Avalon Center. Avalon is an agency working to end domestic and sexual violence by breaking the cycle of abuse through prevention, education, shelter, and support services in the Williamsburg area. Visiting Avalon and learning about their clients made me remember how easy it is to go about life when your life is not touched by violence, poverty, and suffering. We could easily close our eyes, ears, and mouths and stay willfully ignorant about our neighbors in need.

But that is not the way of Jesus. Jesus could always see and hear. Jesus always spoke for the oppressed. As we have journeyed through Luke’s gospel this year, we have heard over and over how Jesus sees us – even when we don’t speak. That is what we are trying to do when we engage in mission and outreach – we are engaging in seeing, hearing, and speaking – in acting on behalf of our neighbor.

So yes, we are going to eat awesome barbeque and Brunswick stew. We are going to ride on hayrides, bid on auction items, and shop through other’s treasures. We will laugh, play, and have fun. But what is tremendously inspiring to me is that all this hard work, all this nourishing fellowship, and all this use of our resources is rooted in walking the way of Christ. Our work leading up to Saturday, and our work on the day of the festival is all our way of saying we commit ourselves to seeing, hearing, and speaking. I hope you will join us!

This past Sunday we kicked off our Fall Stewardship Season, “Living Generously.” I talked about the campaign in my sermon, but we also have many invitations into this time of discernment for our parishioners. We each received a packet of information about the ways we can support the life and ministry of Hickory Neck. We have reflections written by national and parish-level leaders that invite us to consider their experiences around stewardship. And we are having conversations with each other about how pledging works for each of us.

Just last night, the Vestry took on one of those conversations. We looked at the gospel lesson for this coming Sunday (Luke 18.1-8) and talked about the challenge of persistence when it comes to stewardship. We realized that no matter what financial situation or phase of life we are in, living generously does not come naturally or easily, but takes intentionality and persistent commitment. In our small group, we had a person with young children – including some in childcare, a person with teens approaching college, a person who is thinking about retirement but has taken in an aging parent, and a person in retirement on a fixed income. Despite those differences, we all have to be intentional with our commitment to stewardship because we all have commitments that can distract us from generosity and tempt us into scarcity.

There was something powerful about talking about hard keeping our commitment to stewardship is with other parishioners. Too often we take those pledge cards home and embark on a discernment process that is very individualized. Certainly, we all need time with our God on our own to fortify ourselves to being generous stewards. But we also need companions on the journey – fellow parishioners who can say, “Yes, it is hard living generously!” We need those fellow pilgrims because they also remind us of why we keep at it. These are the same people who will remind you why you are grateful. After the Vestry talked about the challenges of living generously, then we talked about the benefits. Stories started pouring in about what we each get out of Church. We talked about the ways that Hickory Neck feeds us and brings us joy. We talked about the ways that, throughout life, God has been so faithful to us, and what an honor it is to be able to harness some of that generosity in our own lives.

On Sunday, I encouraged us to spend some time at home in discernment about our stewardship of God’s abundance. This week, I also want to encourage us to spend some time in discernment with each other. Share those challenges to being a steward; but also share those blessings of being a steward. Those conversations may feed the conversation you have at home and will certainly renew your spirit. Join us as we embark on this journey toward living generously together!

I once knew a man who was impossible to compliment. Whether you wanted to compliment a job well done or good deed, his response was always the same, “It’s not me. All the glory goes to God.” His response always left me feeling like I just offered a present that was rejected. Of course, I totally agreed with what he was saying – none of us is able to do good without the God who empowers us to do so. And truly, Jesus was not that great at accepting compliments either, especially if you recall all the times he asked people to keep a healing secret or to just go back to work. But upon receiving a compliment, a simple, “Thank you,” would not have hurt this man. After a while, I just stopped trying to praise his work or good deeds.

I think that is why I relate to the nine lepers who do not return to Jesus to give him thanks and praise. There were ten lepers originally – nine who were Jewish and one who was a Samaritan. We are not sure why the ten are together – the Jews and the Samaritans were enemies and rarely spent time together.[i] We are told at the beginning of the text that Jesus was passing through a borderland between Samaria and Galilee, so there is a possibility that then ten men banded together through their disease instead of culture. You see, both Samaritans and those of Galilee would have been seen as impure due to their leprosy. Being exiled to the borders of their land, they may have found more in common than divided them. And so, as a group, they shout out to Jesus for healing – careful not to approach him, of course, which would have been improper in their condition. Respecting their distance, Jesus does not insist they come forward, but instead tells them to go to the priest to show themselves to be healed. Along the way, they are healed, but they still would have needed to show a priest in order to be restored to their families and friends.[ii]

The Samaritan among them returns and gives praise to God, but the others do not. We do not know how their journey unfolds. Presumably they are faithfully doing what Jesus told them to do – going to the priest for restoration. Perhaps they give praise to God once the priest restores them. Perhaps they give praise when they are reunited with their families. Maybe they even show their praise through helping lepers later. But that is all supposition. All we get today is Jesus’ criticism of the nine because they neglect to turn and give God praise and thanksgiving.

I have been reflecting on Jesus’ words this week, and what rubs me the wrong way may be the same thing that rubbed me the wrong way when that man I knew always refused praise. In both cases, whether Jesus, or the man I knew, there is both implicit and explicit criticism of my own practice of gratitude and thanksgiving. What irritated me about the man’s responses to me was that they made me feel guilty – that perhaps I was not grateful enough to God for the goodness in my life. The same thing irritates me about Jesus this week – his judgment of the nine makes me feel guilty about the ways I have walked away healed and not given praise to God.

This week we are kicking off our stewardship season in a campaign called, “Living Generously.” After the service, you will be receiving a packet of information about how you can support the ministry of Hickory Neck, and a pledge card that we will collect in a celebratory ingathering in just four weeks. Most preachers would have read the text today and thought, “Yes! The perfect Stewardship text!” But the more I sat with Jesus’ words, the more I realized that his words actually bring up feelings of dread rather than joy. Most people associate stewardship with the same sense of guilt that this reading brings up. We feel guilted into showing gratitude, and so we guiltily look at our budgets and see if we can increase our pledge this year.

The first time I experienced the concept of pledging was when I started regularly attending an Episcopal Church. In the churches where I grew up, you never had to tell anyone what you were going to give. The preacher might have talked about a tithe – ten percent of your income. But the preacher never wanted you to say exactly what you were going to give. So when the warden of this church started explaining how he wanted us to pledge, I was aghast. I remember thinking, “That’s private! I don’t have to tell you how much I am going to give!” Now, I knew we would probably tithe that year, but the idea of telling someone else about my giving seemed to go against every cultural norm I knew. Fortunately, I stayed to hear the rest of the warden’s talk. He explained that the way the church formed the church’s budget was through the knowledge of what income they could expect. The Vestry would adjust expenses accordingly and try to get the budget balanced. My outrage faded as I realized how responsible that model seemed. Thus began my adult journey into pledging.

But that journey into pledging experienced a transformation about eight years later. We were at a new church, and the priest asked to hold our pledge cards until a particular Sunday. We did and the funniest thing happened. In the middle of the service, a banner appeared. The banner was processed down the aisle, joyful music started playing, and people started following the banner forward. We placed our pledge in a basket, and I felt something stirring in me. The priest blessed the pile of pledge cards, and something about stewardship turned in my heart – the pledging, the monthly giving was no longer an obligation or burden – something to be guilted into. My pledge was a joyful sign of gratitude – a sign blessed by God and affirmed by the community. And I have to say – it felt good!

In the gospel lesson today, the text says that the Samaritan turns back to Jesus. That word for turns back is more than just a physical description – the action of turning back is a sign of deep transformation – a reorienting of the Samaritan’s life from duty to gratitude.[iii] I do not think Jesus was looking for a guilty admission of thanks from the other nine lepers. What Jesus is looking for is a transformation of the heart – a turning of one’s life away from obligation and duty to joyful gratitude and thanksgiving.

I was reading this week about a woman with an interesting habit. Whenever someone asked her how she is – that basic question we always ask and anticipate the answer being, “Fine,” – instead she would say, “I’m grateful.” No matter what is on her plate – stress at work or school, an illness that kept plaguing her, strife at home – her response is always the same, “I’m grateful.”[iv] As I thought about her response this week, I realized that her response is probably one that took willful practice. I am sure there were weeks when she really felt grateful. But there were also probably weeks when she had to say she felt grateful even if she was not sure what there was to be grateful about. But slowly, slowly, I imagine the practice cultivated a spirit of gratitude. A practice like that can do exactly what Jesus wants for us all – a turning of the heart to praise and thanksgiving. I know I will never be able to shift toward the kind of response that the man I knew always gave, rejecting praise altogether. But learning to say, “I’m grateful,” might be a way for me to get a little closer to the same sentiment.

What that woman is doing, what Jesus is encouraging, and even what our Stewardship campaign is inviting is not a sense of guilt or burden, but a genuine invitation into a life that turns our heart to gratitude and transforms the way we see the world. Now that does not mean that every time you write the check to fulfill your pledge you will part from that treasure with a joyful heart. But that practice is a small invitation, every time, for us to turn our hearts and to see not only the God from whom all blessings flow, but to even see the blessings in the first place. Jesus is not mad at those lepers because they are ungrateful – he is sad for them because they have denied themselves the gift of transformation. That is the gift that he and the Church offer us every week – the gift of a transformed heart that can change everything. For that, I’m grateful. Amen.

This weekend was the big fall cleanup of our property at church. We trimmed trees and hedges, put down mulch in flower beds and around trees, cleared out debris, and pulled weeds. Because I had one of the youngest workers with me that day, we were put on “stick patrol,” clearing out the sticks that had fallen from the enormous trees in the front of the property. When I first glanced at the area, I was not too worried. You could see some sticks, but not a large amount. I remember thinking the project would not take long. But all too quickly I realized that the more I got down in the grass, the more small sticks I saw. A scan of the grass from a distance was totally different from getting down in the dirt and seeing what was really there.

I have been thinking about how my quick scan of the grass that day is a lot like living with the benefit of privilege. I realize that talking about privilege makes many of us anxious. We feel like we are being blamed for something we cannot control and we can probably name multiple hurdles we have had to overcome in life that do not make us feel privileged at all.

While all of that may be true, one the signs of benefiting from privilege is that we are able to scan the grass without really looking through the blades for sticks. Just today, on what was an otherwise beautifully wooded drive, I passed by a community of mobile homes, a nursing home, and a domestic violence shelter. If I had wanted to, my privilege could have allowed me to keep on driving and listening to music without thinking about the poverty and its impact on the individuals and families in the mobile homes. If I had wanted to, I could have smiled at the lovely sign of the nursing home without thinking about those inside who are homebound, lonely, or sick. If I had wanted to, I could have driven by the unmarked domestic violence shelter, never once thinking about the emotional, physical, psychological, and spiritual effects of violence on the women and children who live there. My privilege in life, whether racial, socioeconomic, or age, allows me to scan the grass without seeing the sticks.

Jesus ministry was all about seeing the sticks: the Samaritan woman at the well, the blind man by the road, the hemorrhaging woman who touched the hem of his cloak, the demoniac on the hill. Jesus could have easily passed all of these by, staying focused on teaching and preaching. But Jesus rarely scanned the grass – he was always rooting around for the sticks. In fact, he was rarely interested in how pretty the lawn looked. He wanted to tend between the blades. That is the kind of attention that Jesus invites us into every week. Jesus invites us to let go of the comfort and satisfaction that comes from scanning the lush lawn, and instead, invites us to get down on our knees, to get dirty rooting around in the blades, and to always hold in tension how our privilege lures us into much more comfortable work. I look forward to hearing what you find as you cede some of your privilege and start playing in the grass.

One of the funny things about wearing a priestly collar in public is that people tend to tell you way more about their lives than perhaps they should. As soon as a person realizes you are a priest, the flood gates open and all of a sudden you are the guest on the “Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Church But Were Afraid to Ask!” Show. I get questions about how one becomes a priest, what being an Episcopalian means, and what kind of Christian I am. But mostly I get confessions. People will confess they used to go to church, but once they became an adult, they had a hard time believing everything the church taught them as a child. People will confess that they were raised in the church, but when a terrible tragedy hit, they felt abandoned by God and could never go back. People will confess that they miss going to church, but that they always feel like they do not belong when the go to church – that everyone in the church seems to have their lives figured out except them.

What is interesting to me about those conversations with non-church goers or lapsed Christians is that they seem to think that their struggles with faith make them ineligible for church membership. Perhaps that is true in some denominations in our country. But one of the primary reason I became an Episcopalian was because the Episcopal Church not only made room for faith struggles, but expected those struggles. Almost every time I have raised a question about a Biblical text in Bible Study, instead of someone explaining the answer to me, the response is almost always, “Yeah, that is a hard piece of scripture.” Almost every time I have been with a grieving family who is on the brink of questioning their faith, no one in the room challenges them. Usually someone says, “I could totally see how you would be doubting God right now.” And almost every time I have been in a class about theology, the creeds, confirmation, or baptism, someone has asked, “What if I can’t believe that part.” Never once has that person been told they do not belong if they cannot believe – in fact, usually the person is praised for naming the lack of faith we have all have had at some point in our spiritual journey.

I think that is why today’s Gospel lesson feels so real. The disciples and apostles have been following Jesus for weeks, and Jesus has been handing them a lot of heavy stuff. Jesus has told them to give up their possessions, to forgive those who wrong them, to take up their cross. I cannot imagine anyone looking at the stark life Jesus describes and not calling out, “Increase our faith!” How else can we be all Jesus wants us to be without increasing our faith? Surely we have all had those trough moments – in the face of our mortality, at the betrayal of a friend or spouse, in the midst of anxiety and stress – when we too cry out to God, “Increase our faith!”

What might be helpful to do is talk a little about what we mean when we say faith. Marcus Borg talks about two different kinds of faith: faith of the head and faith of the heart. Faith of the head is claiming something about God or the human condition. This kind of faith is more about what we believe. When someone says they have lost their faith, they have often lost this faith of the head. They no longer believe something taught by holy scripture or the church. In the Episcopal Church, we do not get too upset about this kind of faith struggle. Instead, we see faith as ever evolving and growing. Questions are at the root of a deep, mature faith. Borg would argue that God cares very little about what beliefs are in our heads – if we believe the right things. Borg knows that you can believe all the right things and still be in bondage, because, “Believing a set of claims to be true has very little transforming power.”[i]

Unlike faith of the head, faith of the heart is a little different, according to Borg. Faith of the heart is characterized by three things: trust, fidelity, and vision. To have faith of the heart is to put a radical trust in God – to rely on God for grounding and safety. Faith of the heart is also characterized by fidelity – an understanding that we will be faithful in our relationship with God and God with us. Faith of the heart is finally characterized by vision – a belief that reality is life-giving and nourishing instead of threatening or hostile. “To live in faith requires ‘a radical centering (of our lives) in God that leads to a deepening trust that transforms the way we see and live our lives.’”[ii] So when the disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith, they are not necessarily asking Jesus to help them believe certain statements about God to be true (that faith of the head). Instead, they are asking for faith of the heart – to get help in trusting God, remaining faithful in their relationship with God, and seeing life as God-given and gracious.

Now one would hope that Jesus would hear this request from the disciples and come back with a loving response – a pastoral word of encouragement that makes them feel affirmed in their fears and doubts. Unfortunately, that is not what Jesus does at all today. Instead he tells an abrasive story about masters and servants, which is basically Jesus’ way of saying, “You want your faith to increase? Then get out there and do the work you have been given to do.” Instead of assuring and coddling the disciples, Jesus sounds more like that old Nike ad that says, “Just do it!”

I do not know about you, but Jesus’ words are not all that comforting today. I have sat with someone who is overwhelmed by the disappointments of life, and never once did it occur to me to tell them to just go out there and do the work they have been given to do. I have counseled people who are facing death, divorce, job loss, or shame, and I have not told a single one of them to stop complaining and just get back out in the world doing what God has called them to do. I myself have had moments when God felt absent, and I probably would have deemed any counsel to “Just do it!” as insensitive or unfair – to just trust that God is there anyway and get back to work. Where are we supposed to find the strength to be faithful – to trust, to be loyal, to hold on to the vision of God’s goodness – when we feel completely unable to “Just do it!”?

As I struggled with Jesus’ harshness today, I remembered Paul’s second letter to Timothy. Paul says to Timothy, “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you.” Paul’s words this week help me see how we get back to the work Jesus wants us to do. In Paul’s encouragement, he is confident that Timothy can “Just do it!” because he knows Timothy’s identity. Timothy is the grandson of Lois and the son of Eunice. These women have taught him everything he knows about Jesus. They have been through the depths of despair themselves, and yet they are faithful witnesses of God. Timothy is not just a man fighting for faith – Timothy is known by God, and comes from a long line of people who have walked with God. Timothy’s heritage is a heritage of people who have gone before, who have shown him the way through their lives, and who have encouraged him. Now, you may be thinking, “Yeah, except my Grandma was a Southern Baptist who disagrees with what I believe, or my Mom stopped going to church ages ago.” Whether biological or not, we all have grandmothers and mothers of our faith. Maybe they are friends or fellow parishioners. Or maybe those mothers and grandmothers are the matriarchs of our faith. Regardless, we are all rooted in something bigger than us – something with much deeper roots that can ground us when we feel like we are flailing in our faith.

When I first read our gospel lesson this week, I thought we had been cursed with the wrong lessons – especially for those of you who brought friends today. But the more the lessons unfolded, the more I realized they might be the perfect lessons. We all struggle with faith – certainly of the head, but more importantly of the heart. But as Paul reminds us, we come from a long line of people who have gone before who have struggled as we do, and who leaned into their identity as beloved children of God in order to keep putting one foot in front of the other. We are encouraged today because we have seen the fruit of “Just doing it!” We have prayed for someone struggling this week. We have called or visited a friend who needed encouragement this week. We stood up to a bully this week. We gave money to support ministry this week. We did something seemingly inconsequential, but those small, everyday acts of faith are powerful, and they are how we answer Jesus’ call to “Just do it!” – even when we did not think we could.[iii] Paul and the Church remind us that we can – we can do those acts of faith because we are surrounded by matriarchs and patriarchs who encourage us along the way. We all have those moments when we just want Jesus to increase our faith. Today we are encouraged by doing – and eventually our faith increases in spite of us. Amen.